From
April to June 1996, I have made a consultancy trip to
CLSU-ANEC and BSU-ANEC. Objective of this mission was
"strengthening the Philippine Affiliated Non-Conventional
Energy Centers in the Firefly Micro Hydro System and it
was funded by DGIS/DST/ML (Dutch ODA dept.). Since then,
I have had little contact with these organisations and
what I know about their work, might be outdated.

ANEC's are organisations reporting to
DOE-NCED (Dept. Of Energy - Non Conventional Energy
Division) and affiliated to universities in provincial
towns. In 1995 there were 19 ANEC's in the Philippines.
Their budget comes from DOE-NCED, but like with many
other government budgets, the money often comes in months
too late. The universities contribute office space and
workshop facilities on their campus, and senior staff
members who remain employed by the university and work
only part time for the ANEC.

During the mission, I worked mostly at
the office of CLSU-ANEC in Munoz. I gathered information
on the firefly chargers that were built and installed. I
wrote reports on technical aspects and on the way CLSU-ANEC
and BSU-ANEC were trying to introduce the firefly. I
participated in a training for farmers on building
firefly chargers at BSU-ANEC.

Farmers build their own
chargers

This workshop was an inspiring event:
Under guidance of junior ANEC staff, some 15 people built
3 chargers and tested them. Most of the participants were
farmers with little technical background, but
enthousiastic about installing a charger in their own
village, provided that they could learn how to install
and maintain it. Clearly ANEC staff were experienced in
giving such trainings: Junior staff were enthousiastic
and self-confident, all necessary materials and equipment
were there, housing and food for participants were
arranged. The final test showed splashing proof that
those 3 groups did produce a working charger. And
finally, there was a party to end the course.

Joel Cubit cutting a
side disk (photo: Simon Taylor, taken during an earlier
workshop)

Conrad
... brass-solders a runner. Complicated jobs were done by
junior ANEC staff. He wears dark sunglasses and there is
a can around the runner to reduce heat losses. This makes
good quality soldering much easier.

Senior
staff of CLSU- and BSU-ANEC overlooking the final test.
From left to right: mrs. Betty Malamug, Engr. John
Malamug, mr. Edgar Molinas and Engr. Angelito Angeles. Mr.
Angeles and mr. Malamug are director of resp. CLSU-ANEC
and BSU-ANEC, while mrs. Malamug and mr. Molinas are
assistant director. There are close ties between these
ANEC's as mr. and mrs. Malamug are married and mr.
Malamug visited CLSU-ANEC often.

The site for the final test:
More than enough head, plenty of flow, a beautiful area,
but not a typical site for a charger: It would be wiped
out the first time there is some heavy rains.

Participants and
staff after succesful test of the 3 chargers made during
the course.

Approach

The CLSU- / BSU-ANEC approach was quite
different from that of PRRM:

Focus on building chargers. There
was little attention on what more is needed to
make use of the charger: Batteries, suitable
lamps, cable, switches, charge indicator.

No community organizing. This is
logic considering their technical background and
they were willing to cooperate with an
organisation with a strong community organising
background: PRRM. A more serious point is that
they were willing to give away chargers for free,
as 'social projects' paid for by the government
or by foreign development funding. To me as a
development worker, this sounds wrong because it
creates dependency: What if the the charger
breaks down or if those people have another
problem they want to be solved? Can they come to
CLSU- / BSU-ANEC again who will solve all their
problems? A better approach is to train them to
solve their own problems, like the farmers who
learned to build chargers. Then if the investment
costs are realy too high, loans could be given or
goods could be sold at wholesale prices.

There was a tendency to go for
'showcase projects': Something concrete and
spectacular that can can be officially opened by
the governor with pictures in the newspapers.
When it breaks down after a few days, weeks or
months: Who cares?

There was no commitment to
introducing the firefly. It was considered useful
as a step towards 'KiloWatt level' Micro Hydro,
so more powerful turbines driving 110 V AC
generators and they saw this as their 'Flagship
technology'

This may sound like severe criticism,
but one has to consider the position those ANEC's were in:

Funding problems: They have to
show some beautiful results fast in order to
compete for funding.

Political system: Politicians need
showcase projects in order to get re-elected and
they are willing to fund such projects. And you'd
better stay frends with them.

CLSU- and BSU-ANEC also have to
work on introducing other renewableare energy
technologies like biogas, solar energy and
hydraulic rams

In terms of chargers produced, this
approach was quite succesful: Up to June 1996, some 18
chargers were produced. Some of these were made during a
joint workshop with PRRM and PRRM will count these as
their projects. CLSU-ANEC had 2 chargers installed but
neither of them was operational: One was at the Palasapas
site where the creek had dried up and the other one was
connected to the discharge pipe of an irrigation pump
that was not used at the time. BSU-ANEC had 10 chargers
installed , with 3 of them not functioning at that time:
One because there was nobody to operate it, one because
of lack of water since using it for irrigation had
priority, and one because it was meant for demonstrating
it only once. The 3 chargers produced during the
workshop, were planned to be installed soon in BSU-ANEC.
BSU-ANEC was more succesful in introducing the firefly
because:

BSU-ANEC's working area (the
Cordillera mountain range) is more suitable for
Micro Hydro than CLSU-ANEC's working area (with
mainly lowland plains).

BSU-ANEC employs staff members
from each Cordillera province. They were quite
enthousiastic about the firefly and some staff
members have installed firefly chargers in the
village they come from.

There were no records about numbers of
users, financial results, organisational matters etc.

Demonstration
of a firefly charger in Kabugao: This is within BSU-ANEC's
working area, but 2 days travelling away from Baguio,
where BSU-ANEC is based.

Drawing copied from a
leaflet spread by XU-ANEC (Xavier University, Cagayan de
Oro). They bought 2 chargers from CLSU / BSU-ANEC for
demonstrations in their own area and lent out one to DOE-MFO
(Dept. Of Energy - Mindanao Field Office). They plan to
manufacture more chargers.

Quality

Mr. Angelito V. Angeles of CLSU-ANEC
and I have had some heated arguments about the technical
quality of their chargers.

Pipe losses: Mr. Angeles insisted
that a 2" PE pipe was large enough for the
charger. To compensate for high pipe losses, he
recommended that sites with 15 m head or more
should be used. A higher head usually means a
longer pipe, pipe losses consuming far more power
than the turbine itself and an electrical power
output that is too low to charge large batteries
within a reasonable time.
With a 2.5" or 3" pipe, many more sites
with a head of 5 m or above can be used. Also
high head sites tend to be further away from
communities: Nobody will try to build a house or
cultivate crops at the steepest valley sides.

Switchboard problems: They sticked
to using mechanical regulators and connecting
them the same way as in a car. They did not
readjust charging voltage to 14.7 V, so it would
take excessively long to get batteries fully
charged. For some installations, they did not
connect some of the wires to the regulator and as
far as I know, this must have disabled the
regulator in such a way that it will continue to
charge irrespective of battery voltage. Probably
they never noticed because at low power output,
it takes very long before a battery is fully
charged and even then, voltage won't rise above
16 V. Also they fitted standard 0 - 30 V voltage
indicators and 0 - 20 A (or 0 - 30 A) current
indicators. With these, it is impossible to tell
accurately whether a battery is charged well
enough to be disconnected or not. Mr. Angeles
recommended to use a specific gravity meter
instead. I don't like that because it means
opening up the battery, with the risk of dirt
coming in and sulphuric acid spilled around. Also
such meters break quite easily.

Deep discharge of batteries: Mr.
Angeles did not recommend to install charge
indicators. This was not just because they only
dealt with the charger and left it to users to
wire up their house. Mr. Angeles told me it was
the "Philippine way" to use a battery
until it was flat empty and then have it
recharged when it is convenient to do so. This
comes down to severe maltreatment of expensive
batteries but he argued that even with this,
battery life span was acceptable. Probably he was
right on that because users won't notice when
capacity of their battery drops below 80 % of its
rated capacity and technically, it is considered
worn out. Apparently it does take 2 - 3 years
before a battery wears out so much that it
becomes useless.

The charger itself: Chargers were
built rather hastily. With their equipment and
technical skills, they could have done better if
they cared. For instance the gap between runner
and nozzle often was very wide so that part of
the flow would bypass the runner. Also the slots
in side disks where the blades will fit in, were
cut with a larger radius than designed. This
makes blades much less strong but there were no
records about blades breaking out, probably
because their net head at the charger was always
quite low due to high pipe losses.

One of the chargers:
There was a gap of a few mm between runner and nozze and
quite some water leaks away there.

CLSU-ANEC and BSU-ANEC
started to build chargers before my building manual was
available. They kept on using the same kind of frame as
the original Cambulo prototype: With a horizontal shaft
and the pipe at an angle of 45 °.

Towards the end of my stay, CLSU-ANEC people got
involved in doing 'social projects' funded by the
Casecnan project, a large, controversial hydropower
project. People who were to be displaced due to the
construction of this canal, could get hand tractors for
free. CLSU-ANEC wanted to install Kilowatt level micro
hydro generators there, but could not guarantee that
those systems could be built fast enough so diesel
generators were chosen, with little chance that free
diesel would come in once the project was finished and
those people forgotten. But if there is no money and the
ANEC is about to fall apart, such projects do offer a
chance to survive.

"Kilowat level"

When we discussed the
project proposal for the mission, mr. Angeles argued that
the firefly was "proven technology" and that it
would be introduced fast all over the Philippines through
the ANEC network. By then, he was much more interested in
Micro Hydro systems generating 110 V AC with a capacity
of 1 kW or above. CLSU-ANEC and BSU-ANEC had already
installed a prototype system in Palasapas, a small
village near CLSU-ANEC. For the turbine, he used a scaled-up
version of the Firefly turbine. As generator, he used the
synchronous generator from a gasoline driven generator
set. The only problem was to find a suitable Electronic
Load Controller (ELC) and he asked for my help on that.
My frend Siem Broersen thought that designing a simple
ELC was feasible and he worked out a prototype circuit
design. After some changes, testing and more changes, we
got a functioning ELC that was delivered to CLSU-ANEC a
few months before the mission.

During
the mission, I visited the Palasapas prototype system, I
demonstrated the ELC with the generator driven by a
gasoline engine and we discussed technical details of
such systems. There was some technical trouble with the
Palasapas system: A bearing had worn out because of water
entering it along the shaft. The turbine had come loose
from its foundation, probably because there were no
expansion joints in penstock pipe. And again, too small a
diameter pipe was used so pipe losses must have been way
too high. But there were more serious problems:

The site was unsuitable. Even
several weeks after the start of rainy season,
the creek carried way too little flow to power
this turbine and probably the turbine could run
only just after heavy rains. Having their village
connected to the national grid (only 1.3 km away)
would have been a much better way to electrify
this village.

Mr Angeles and his staff thought
that all they needed was an ELC to keep generator
voltage in check. They did not believe that user
appliances could be destroyed just as well if
frequency is way off nominal. In my eyes, they
underestimated the electrical side of a 110 V AC
system.

Mr. Angeles was worried about getting
enough ELC's for his kW level projects after I would have
returned to the Netherlands. So he urged me to make more
ELC's of the prototype design before the end of the
mission. This was not covered by the Terms of Reference
of the mission's time and there was no more time to build
them myself. Luckily, mr. Elmer ..... a neighbour of a
frend, was willing to buy components, make PCB's and
build them. When we tested them together, we found only a
few tiny errors. By the time I left, 4 ELC's were ready,
the last one only needed some new parts to be fitted. I
left them with my frend, but they were never collected
and paid for. In July 1999, mr. Angeles was interested in
the newer and better tested ELC design. He mailed me:
"I am interested to field test one in actual
conditions including near mis-use, and mis-use to know
how durable the design is". I did not go for that, I
wanted someone to test out how it could be kept working,
not someone to proof how easy it is to destroy it.

All in all, mr. Angeles' kW level plans
did have an impact: It made me develop an ELC design that
was eventually used by other people, see Humming bird ELC /
IGC

The Palasapas
turbine and power house.

mr. Elmer ... testing one of his ELC's.

The
commercial approach: Top Ace motor works

My frend Huub Luyk knew Top Ace motor works, a
large metal workshop whose manager, mr. Benito Tiong, was
interested in Micro Hydro. Based on the firefly manual,
mr. Tiong made a price quotation and came up with a very
reasonable price: ca. US$ 150 for the charger without
switchboard. I met mr. Tiong a couple of times and
visited his workshop. Clearly, mr. Tiong was determined
to, and capable of, producing good quality chargers. He
suggested ways to produce the charger cheaper. In the
Philippines, this is not as logic as it seems, as many
business people think from the marketing side and are
primarily interested in finding new ways to sell their
products at a higher price.

Now there was a problem on the demand
side: How could potential customers get in touch with Top
Ace and order a charger so that Top Ace could start
producing a small series. Top Ace would not do "turn-key
firefly projects" so other parties were needed to
advise potential users, help selecting a site, design
civil works, wire up houses, sell batteries at a
reasonable price etc. This is where ideas about good
development projects come into play. I would have loved
Top Ace to produce chargers and make a profit on it. Also
DGIS/DST/ML (the Dutch ODA dept. that funded my mission)
would like a private company to be involved and sell
commodities at realistic prices. I think that mr. John
Malamug, the manager of BSU-ANEC, was in favour of such
contacts with Top Ace. BSU-ANEC received more requests
for demonstration chargers than they could handle
themselves and likely, he will have referred such people
to Top Ace. But I doubt whether it fitted in mr. Angeles
way of working: He wanted "social projects", so
giving away chargers for free. He thought the chargers
they built themselves, were good enough so no need to
improve quality. The firefly building workshops were a
showcase success for them so I don't think that he would
like to put an end to it Also he was used to decide
himself who could be beneficiaries of his M.H. projects,
and not just sell products to customers who were willing
to pay for it. Also for PRRM it would have been a big
step to allow a private company to earn a profit from
their Micro Hydro projects.

mr. Tiong (left)
looking at my jigs and jigsaw machine for cutting side
disks in series. The other people are, from left to right:
mr. Edgar Molinas, and Jackson ..., both of BSU-ANEC, and
mr. Tiong's assistant

I have not been in touch
with Top Ace motor works since 1996 and I haven't heared
about any chargers being built by them.

A Philippine-wide firefly
introduction project

Besides my work for the ANEC's, I have
tried to establish contacts with other organisations in
the Philippines that could play a role in a future,
Philippine-wide firefly introduction project. At that
moment, it looked like there were possibilities for
substantial funding from DGIS/DST/ML for such a project.
But it never came off the ground:

I did not find an organisation (or
a group of organisations) that were interested
and capable of planning such a project, applying
for funding and then implementing it.

Dutch development aid funding was
restructured in such a way that decisions about
funding would be made at Dutch embassies instead
of in The Hague. So getting a project off the
ground was primarily a matter between a
Philippine organisation and the Dutch Embassy. As
a Dutch technical consultant, I could do little
to stimulate that process.

Is the firefly too
cheap?

When I wrote the manual, I hoped that
after some initial technology development and
introduction projects, the firefly technology would
spread by itself. This has not happened: On the whole,
the firefly plays a negligible role in providing energy
services to isolated, rural areas in the Philippines.
Meanwhile, solar energy has been introduced succesfully
in a number of developing countries and I guess the same
has happened in the Philippines. An infrastructure for
supply, installation, maintenance and repair has
developed and prices have come down. A typical Solar Home
System (SHS) consists of a solar panel, Battery Control
Unit, a battery and a few fluorescent lamps. Both the
firefly and a SHS can power about the same types of
appliances. The firefly is more flexible in terms of
energy usage as one could just have the battery recharged
more often if one would like to consume more energy. A
disadvantage of the firefly is that it requires more care
(for checking battery state of charge) and more work (for
bringing the battery to be recharged and collecting it
later).

If one looks at costs, the firefly is
much cheaper: Back in 1992, investment costs per house
for the firefly were about 1/10 of those for a SHS.
Investment costs for a SHS have come down since then and
by now, the firefly will be about 1/5 of a SHS.
Considering this price difference, one would expect that
the firefly would outcompete the SHS in those areas where
suitable sites are abundant and where people are so poor
that spending time is favourable above spending more
money. There must be quite a few such areas in the
Philippines but nowhere the firefly has realy taken off.
This makes one think about other obstacles that hampered
firefly introduction:

Status: Clearly, a solar
panel on your roof gives another impression to
the neighbours than being seen while carrying
your battery down a slippery mountain trail.
Solar energy is high-tech, clean, shiny, silent
and luxurious while the firefly is second hand
car technology, rusty, muddy, noisy and laborious.

Technology push: There are
large companies involved in spreading solar
energy. They have built up a supply chain that
reaches out to village level in areas where solar
energy is widespread. To finance uneconomic
demonstration projects in new areas, they have
access to development funds. The firefly will
never be promoted in such a way. In the
Philippines, the biggest car battery supplier
also produced solar batteries for Solar Home
System and was actively promoting solar energy. I
once spoke to their sales manager but he lost
interest when he learned how cheap the firefly
system is. Selling 10 Solar Home Systems and
making a decent profit margin on it, is
worthwhile. Selling one firefly charger, 10
batteries and a bunch of cables is not. They
would have to charge an excessive profit margin
on it to cover the costs of their Manilla-based
staff, customers would be angry when they would
find out and in the end, it would compete with
their solar energy activities. This leads to a
situation where the ones who might want to
introduce the firefly technology, don't have the
capacities and funds to do so while the ones who
could do it, aren't interested because they can
earn more by producing expensive goods for richer
people.

I think those reasons played a major
role in why the firefly technology never took off in the
Philippines. I realize I played a role in it myself: If I
would have been a smarter technician, I might have come
up with a good design earlier and I would have found and
solved all remaining technical issues. If I would have
been a more enthousiastic salesman, I might have gotten
this Philippine-wide introduction project off the ground.
If I would have worked harder... etc. But I doubt whether
that would have made such a difference that these two
obstacles could have been overcome. I am open to
discussion with anyone who thinks differently about this.